Obama administration backs gay marriages in Supreme Court

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration thinks the Supreme Court should rule that state bans on same-sex marriage are unconstitutional, according to a brief filed by Justice Department lawyers on Friday.WASHINGTON — A wide spectrum of political, religious, and business groups – including the Super Bowl Champion New England Patriots – filed legal briefs at the US Supreme Court on Friday urging the justices to rule in favor of same-sex marriage in the upcoming blockbuster case. The filings are among more than 70 friend of the court briefs being submitted in support of same-sex couples in Ohio, Michigan, Tennessee, and Kentucky.

The Assembly granted final approval of the right-to-work bill that allows employees in union workplaces to opt out of dues and membership 62-35 along party lines. The Patriots play in Massachusetts, the first state to allow same-sex couples to marry, and the Giants represent a city that is notable for its gay and lesbian community. ‘‘We’re a small but visible business and I actually think it’s important that we send this signal of inclusion to the entire region,’’ Auld said in a telephone interview Thursday as he watched the Rays’ first spring training game in Port Charlotte, Florida. That view of marriage as entirely geared toward procreation “would hardly be recognizable” to most married couples. “Just as a State could not rely on an interest in democratic decisionmaking to prohibit marriage between individuals of a different race … it cannot rely on such an interest to prohibit marriage between individuals of the same sex,” the government argues. BOSTON — A Massachusetts high school dean charged with the attempted execution-style murder of a student he had inducted into an alleged drug ring had once worked with Boston police on efforts to combat drugs and gangs, a police spokesman said on Friday. Cincinnati Mayor John Cranley says he is not sure how his constituents feel about the issue, but said it wouldn’t affect his view either way. ‘‘I don’t think constitutional rights are subject to public opinion,’’ Cranley said.

Shaun Harrison, the now-fired dean of The English High School, hired one of his students to sell marijuana and shot the 17-year-old boy in the back of the head on a Boston street Tuesday night after a disagreement. The victim, whose name was not released due to his youth, is expected to survive his injuries, according to the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office.

But this current crop of briefs is the largest showing so far. “It shows the extraordinary broad base of support,” Camilla Taylor of the gay rights group, Lambda Legal, told reporters in a teleconference on Friday. In addition to the Patriots professional football team, two major league baseball teams, the San Francisco Giants and the Tampa Bay Rays, also joined that brief.

BOSTON — Hundreds of millions of Windows PC users are vulnerable to attacks exploiting the recently uncovered “Freak” security vulnerability, which was initially believed to only threaten mobile devices and Mac computers, Microsoft Corp warned on Thursday. The companies said that the “fractured legal landscape” with some states recognizing same-sex marriage and others banning it is harmful to employers and employees.

News of the vulnerability surfaced on Tuesday when a group of nine security experts disclosed that ubiquitous Internet encryption technology could make devices running Apple Inc’s iOS and Mac operating systems, along with Google Inc’s Android browser vulnerable to cyberattacks. They said the patchwork of laws imposes an economic cost on businesses of $1 billion a year – including making it harder for companies in certain states to recruit and retain the most talented employees. “My view on this is pretty simple,” he said. “I don’t think there is a legal justification for a different legal treatment of these particular relationships.” He said his brother is gay and married, and that by watching his brother and his partner interact, he had come to the conclusion that there was no moral justification for preventing same-sex marriages. “I happen to be a big believer in individual rights,” he said. “We should simply permit people who are in love to marry the people who they are in love with.” Officially, the Republican Party is opposed to same-sex marriage. The wreck of a derailed BNSF Railway train loaded with crude oil from North Dakota was still burning 164 miles west of Chicago on Friday, and the company warned that shipments along the line could be delayed up to 48 hours. … Two brothers were charged with murder on Friday stemming from the shooting death of a Philadelphia police officer during the botched robbery of a game store, authorities said. Stanley McChrystal, Maine Senator Susan Collins, Illinois Senator Mark Kirk, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, investor and philanthropist Daniel Loeb, and Hewlett-Packard President and CEO Meg Whitman.

Gay Clark Jennings, president of the House of Deputies of the Episcopal Church, told reporters that the issue in the case was civil marriage, not religious marriage.